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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
Conclusion
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailashsagarsuri Gyanmandir
For Private And Personal
765
(7) The Soul and the Body:
The body is supposed to be the vehicle and instrument of the soul; the body furnishes knowledge by means of the sense-perception to the soul. The soul depends for actions on the body for the knowledge by sense-perception. The Vedas, Upanisads and the Aranyakas and Brahmanas look upon the soul as different from the body that it occupies. Carvākas identify the soul with the living body. Buddhism establishes a correspondence between the two series of mental and bodily states. Jainism, Nyaya Vais'esika, Samkhya, Purva Mimamsa, Advaita Vedanta, Vis'iştadvaita, Nimbārka, Madhva, Śuddhādvaita, all the Vaisnavas, Saivas, Saktas agree in holding that the soul and the body are different from each other. Souls obtain bodies which are suitable to them in accordance with their previous karmas, the body is perishable and some thing which is filthy. The senses are deceptive and being liable to temptation of sensuous experiences, the soul is dragged down and polluted by the body. The soul can control the body by knowledge and will. All the systems except Carvākism discard body and its pleasures and extol the value of the bodiless soul and its supersensuous happiness. The Vaisnava Saints, S'aivas, Yoga and Advaita Vedanta seek to exploit the body for the purposes of the soul by purifying it with self-control and by dedicating it completely to God. Body is generally held as opposed to the soul as is darkness opposed to light, body being jada (non-conscious). The corporeal body does not exist in the state of
